The Indian PATA and the mysterious MANOPLE

Mercenary · 31st May 2025, 06:45 PM

Jim, thank you, you are right, this object is from a "living" culture and was used as a weapon in traditional martial arts. And if the handle is new (19th-20th centuries), then the blade, as you pointed out, has a much longer and more complicated history.
The pata sword was not only a weapon of the Marathas, but much more often a weapon of their opponents: the principalities of Rajasthan and the sultanates of the Deccan, and was also used throughout the rest of India.
I was interested not so much in the "face" on the handle (usually it is either a stylized image of a tiger or a person; in the case of a tiger, these would be the animal's ears, and in the case of a person - mustache or a third eye), as in the image of Garuda. This is a rarity in medieval and modern India - the cult of Garuda is more common in Nepal and Southeast Asia. This allows us to localize your object in South India, where the cult of Garuda has survived to this day as part of the Vaishnavism tradition. And this cult is directly connected with the warrior traditions, although to a lesser extent than the cult of Hanuman: in the South Indian kingdom of Hoysala there was a group of the bravest warriors, especially devoted to the ruler, who were called the Garuda warriors (Garuda served Vishnu as his vahana, so these warriors served the king).
Thank you for sharing this unusual item!

31st May 2025, 06:45 PM	#9
Mercenary Member Join Date: Apr 2011 Location: Moscow, Russia Posts: 428	Jim, thank you, you are right, this object is from a "living" culture and was used as a weapon in traditional martial arts. And if the handle is new (19th-20th centuries), then the blade, as you pointed out, has a much longer and more complicated history. The pata sword was not only a weapon of the Marathas, but much more often a weapon of their opponents: the principalities of Rajasthan and the sultanates of the Deccan, and was also used throughout the rest of India. I was interested not so much in the "face" on the handle (usually it is either a stylized image of a tiger or a person; in the case of a tiger, these would be the animal's ears, and in the case of a person - mustache or a third eye), as in the image of Garuda. This is a rarity in medieval and modern India - the cult of Garuda is more common in Nepal and Southeast Asia. This allows us to localize your object in South India, where the cult of Garuda has survived to this day as part of the Vaishnavism tradition. And this cult is directly connected with the warrior traditions, although to a lesser extent than the cult of Hanuman: in the South Indian kingdom of Hoysala there was a group of the bravest warriors, especially devoted to the ruler, who were called the Garuda warriors (Garuda served Vishnu as his vahana, so these warriors served the king). Thank you for sharing this unusual item!